What about weather piques peoples' interest?

Readers send in thousands of weather photos to 12 News and azcentral.com each year. This one was taken in a reader's backyard near 136th Street and Rio Verde Drive in Scottsdale on July 26, 2014(Photo: Michael H./Special for The Republic)

Arizona's oppressive summertime heat forces the sweat from all pores alike, just as the rain makes us all equally worse drivers (don't try to deny it) and the thunder scares our more cowardly pets.

Then there is the monsoon season.

The summer ritual brings downed trees and power outages that respect no boundaries. Flash flood warnings abound. The Valley roadways become a nightmare. Social media erupts with reports of weather from all over the region.

When it comes to weather, we are all in this together.

"A lot of our livelihoods and our daily activities are dependent on the weather. As routine as 'do I need to wear a hat or grab an umbrella' to high impact events all like the strong winds in the NE valley that directly impacts people lives home and property," said Gary Woodall, meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Phoenix.

Saturday evening's severe thunderstorms and downbursts with 80 mile-per-hour hurricane-force winds, stirred up more than dust as residents all across the Valley recorded the images and videos of how the storm affected them, from lightning strikes and broken tree branches to rain-spattered windows.

The weather impacts agriculture, transportation and businesses. At Cartel Coffee Lab in downtown Phoenix, business goes up on stormy days as customers seek out the "cool coffee shop vibe," said Riley Jones, an employee at Cartel.

For Blake Wilson and Matt Watkins, bartenders at Culinary Dropout in Scottsdale reading the news for weather helps them make decisions for work.

"It definitely affects our jobs," Watkins said, "If there is a dust storm or a monsoon we need to know about it."

Even on their days off, the pair take weather into account, cooling off with a session of flow boarding at FlowRider at CityScape in downtown Phoenix Wednesday, a day when the National Weather Service issued an excessive heat warning for all of Maricopa County with temperatures reaching over 110 degrees.

Emilio Garcia, 17, also checks the news for the day's high temperature, which seemed especially important on Wednesday as he waited outside the US Airways Center sipping on a cool drink waiting for the Lady Gaga Concert to begin.

"I want to know how hot it's going to be when going out," he said.

For Woodall, weather has been a lifelong interest.

"I was actually interested in weather going all the way back to my elementary school years. I grew up in Florida and hurricanes were big news stories there," he said. "It's been a lifelong interest for me that I've been fortunate enough to turn into my career."

The 105 degree high of June 26, 2014, was practically chilly compared to the temperature on the same date 24 years earlier when Phoenix experienced its hottest day on record. Let's take a look at some of the other extreme weather days.